


This Isn't the End

by Elvenheart993



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-07-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 08:33:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25347769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elvenheart993/pseuds/Elvenheart993
Summary: In the wake of his own death, Fred faces the choice of one unprepared to leave the world so soon.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	This Isn't the End

**Author's Note:**

> I was searching through my old stories when low and behold this appeared. I'd completely forgotten about it. I had written it a few years ago and then never posted it.  
> So do enjoy!

** This Isn’t The End **

_To these memories I will hold,  
With your blessing I will go,  
To turn at last to paths that lead home,_

_And though where the road then takes me,  
I cannot tell,  
We came all this way,  
But now comes the day,  
To bid you farewell  
_ **The Last Goodbye – Billy Boyd**

Fred opened his eyes and squinted at the brightness that greeted him. It was eerily silent, and the last thing he could remember was the air being full of shouting and banging as chaos and commotion surrounded him. Had he blacked out? Was it over or had he just dreamt the entire thing? Fred couldn’t tell.

“Percy?” He called out as he slowly sat up and peered around him. All he could see was white, like he was in St Mungos but there was no furniture, there weren’t even any kind of shapes at all. Just white.  
“Ron? Harry?” He tried again, and heard his voice echo in the distance. “What’s happening?”

Fred swallowed a frightened lump as he turned on the spot and then looked down at himself. His clothes were intact and clean, and just the same as they had been when they left Muriel’s for Hogwarts. How could that be? He remembered a severing charm narrowly missing his arm and slicing through the sleeve.

Somewhere, deep down in his gut Fred knew exactly what was happening. He didn’t want to face the thought, so he buried it under other thoughts and took a few hesitant steps as he tried to tell himself he was dreaming.

“Hey!” He shouted, and his own voice echoed loudly around him.

There was no response from anywhere and Fred found himself walking aimlessly, desperate to find some form of life. He had to be sleeping. Couldn’t he just wake up? Maybe the whole war was a horrible nightmare and he’d wake up in his own bed.

“Where do you think you’re goin’?” An unmistakable growl made Fred turn on the spot and his jaw dropped at the sight that greeted him.

Alastor Moody hardly looked any different than he did the last time Fred had seen him alive. Although his nose was whole, and his skin wasn’t scarred…the magical eye that had been stolen from his corpse had been replaced and spun as unnervingly as ever in its socket.

“Mad-Eye…” Fred said slowly and couldn’t believe he was really seeing the wizard that stood in front of him now. “Wh—I don’t know. What’s happening? Is every one-”

“How do I know how they are?” Moody growled and took a few steps toward Fred, who noted that like the scars, his limp was also gone. “I don’t even know what I’m doin’ here with you.”

Fred stared wide eyed at the former Auror, and looked around again, hoping to see something, any sign that this place wasn’t what he was starting to think it was. His blue eyes returned to the wizard and he felt as uncomfortable as ever as Mad-Eye stared at him unblinking. It was unnerving and he knew immediately it was no illusion.

“What are you doin’ here? Are you a-”

“Of course I’m not alive.” Moody snapped and looked the twin up and down twice, his jaw firm and a scowl set in place firmly. “Hardly the place for a cosy catch up, kid.”

“Then why am I here? And why are you?”

Moody grunted and circled Fred once before crossing his arms over his chest and fixing the twin with a firm look. “Ain’t the sharpest one in the bunch right now are ya?” He sighed and grunted before finishing bluntly. “I’m not alive, Weasley, and neither are you anymore.”

Somewhere deep down, Fred must have known it from the moment he opened his eyes. But if he had subconsciously known, it didn’t make it any easier to hear.  
“No.” He said plainly, and shook his head adamantly. “No, I’m not dead…I’m not dead that’s just stupid-hey!”

Moody had whacked the young wizard over his ginger head and was glowering at him firmly.  
“You better believe it. Makes it a whole lot easier if ya do.”

Fred looked away wide eyed and stared at the empty white space. He couldn’t be dead. He just couldn’t be. What about his family? What about the war? What about George? He couldn’t leave it all behind.  
“No…no, no, no!” He was starting to panic now and backed up a few paces, his blue eyes even bluer as they grew full and damp. “I can’t…I ca-no. I needa wake up!”

“What do you think death is? A nap?” Mad-Eye grumbled but then his tone softened and he clapped a hand onto Fred’s shoulder, bringing the twin’s eyes back to him. “There’s no real waking up.”

As suddenly as he had appeared Moody vanished and Fred was left alone again, shaking and overwhelmed in this place of nothing. Then this was death? Was he to sit here, alone and lost forever longing for his life back?

A broken cry was wrenched from Fred’s throat as he sunk to his knees on the ground and buried his head in his hands.

He didn’t know how long he sat there, time seemed to stand still and it made sense that it did. Sensing a presence, Fred finally lifted his head. His blue eyes were still watery and he was terrified at the idea of never again seeing his family, never living to see Voldemort defeated, and not being there to console George. How long had it been?

“Hey.”

As he lifted his eyes, the first thing Fred saw was the hand extended toward him and he slowly took it, letting the someone pull him to his feet.

It wasn’t one person, but two auburn haired young men who stood before him. They were almost identical, and built like Charlie was, stocky, while their auburn hair and brown eyes very closely resembled Molly Weasley.

“I wonder if you even remember us…you were only three last time we saw you.” Said the first as he let go of Fred’s hand and looked the twin over, “Wasn’t really expectin’ to see any of you again so soon…”

Fred swallowed and looked between the pair before the corner of his lip twitched up just a little and he tried to force his post mortem fears away as he stared in surprise.

“Uncle…Gideon?” His eyes moved over to the man standing a step behind his twin. “Uncle Fabian?”

The Prewett brothers smiled at their nephew, who was now no younger than they themselves had been when they died. But still much too young to have to see this place.

“Hello, Fred.” Fabian Prewett greeted and stepped forward beside his brother to look over Fred. “Boy you sure grew up fast, how old are you?”

“We’re tw-” Fred cut himself off and felt a sharp pain in his still heart. George was alone now. “…I’m twenty.” He finished and looked down at the grass. The grass that hadn’t been there a moment ago.  
Fred lifted his head almost immediately and looked around at his new surroundings.

They seemed to be standing on a small hill that, as he looked around, Fred recognised as leading to the makeshift Quidditch pitch outside the Burrow. Sure enough, when he turned around, he could see the Burrow there looking as warm and comforting as ever.

“Wow, has it really been seventeen years?” Mused Gideon Prewett, “Seems like yesterday Molls was having a baby.”

“What are you doing here?” Fred’s voice came out more like a whisper as he longingly took a step toward the place he knew as home. “Come to take me away? ‘Cause I’m not ready for this…”

“I don’t think there’s always an option for readiness…but I think we’re here to talk you through it.” Fabian stepped around to his nephew’s right side and followed his gaze to the Burrow sadly. “Sorry, you can’t really go back there.”

“I have to…” Fred said and looked at his uncle with wide eyes. His jaw tensed and he swallowed a lump that was rising in his throat. “I gotta know. I have to see them-”

“Are you sure you wanna see them?”

Fred turned to look at Gideon desperately. “More than anything.”

The twins exchanged a look and Fabian nodded. “Well you can, we can show you. Only if you’re sure…”

Fred set his jaw and nodded, taking a step toward Gideon.

“I don’t think you’ll like it…” The older wizard warned as he lifted his hand and held it palm out in front of him. Slowly, he drew a circle in the air and it shimmered for a moment in front of Fred who felt his eyes fill as an image slowly appeared.

“Oh Merlin, no…”

Sure enough, he saw his family. He saw his siblings, and his sister-in-law and his parents all together…all huddled around his dead body. At least, _almost_ all. George wasn’t there. It was surreal to see himself lying there unmoving and unbreathing and Fred finally knew for sure that he was truly dead and gone from that world.  
None of that mattered now, what mattered was the tears and the anguish that was surrounding the people he loved. What mattered was the pain he could feel in his forever still heart. What mattered was seeing George collapse by his head, throwing his own back in a tortured cry that Fred could hear echoing inside his own head.

“No!” Fred cried, staggering back a step and gripping at his hair. He couldn’t look away. It was terrible, and he wanted to hide from it, but he felt like if he looked away now, he might never get to see them again and he would be forever lost.

“Merlin, no…Georgie…Mum…”

A strangled sob tore from his throat and he couldn’t stop the tears falling along with his twin who was sobbing over his body with Charlie’s arms wrapped tightly around him trying to hold him still. The image suddenly faded and Fred would have sunk to his knees on the grass had an arm not encircled his shoulders. This wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair to him, it wasn’t fair to his parents and it especially wasn’t fair to George.

He shook his ginger head and tried to wrench himself away from Fabian to run toward the Burrow. Fred didn’t know why, but he felt like if he could only reach it, he would be home. He would be where he should be again.

“No! Let me go, let me go! I ca-can’t be dead, I can’t stay dead!”

He fought and he struggled in vain against Fabian’s restraining hold around his shoulders.

On Fred’s left, Gideon pityingly tried to calm his nephew whose tears were still flowing freely.  
“You can’t go there yet! You don’t understand what it means. Fred…easy, just listen…just listen, kid.”

“If you go choose to go back, you choose to be a ghost.” Fabian added as Fred’s fighting began to ease a little. “And you don’t really know what that means…”

“You can’t choose when you don’t understand.” Gideon finished.

Fred went slack and stopped fighting, and when Fabian’s arms loosened around him, he took one step forward and stared down the hill at his life.  
Another silver tear slid down his cheek as he looked down.

If being a ghost meant he could go back and stay with his family, with his twin, then losing his physical body was a price he was willing to pay.

“I don’t care…” He muttered and took another step.

“You should care.” Gideon said warningly. “There’s a reason not many witches or wizards choose that path.”

“Kid, believe us…we of all people know how you feel.” Fabian added calmly and stepped in front of Fred to make him give them his attention.

Fred’s lifeless blue eyes flashed and he shook his head slowly at his uncles.  
“No you don’t! You _died_ together, and he’s alone now!” His voice broke and he barely stopped himself bursting into sobs again. “George has never been alone… _I’ve_ never been alone. I don’t know how.”

“And would you rather go down together? Would you rather George have died too?”

Fred’s mouth opened and closed a few times before he turned away, his fists clenched and shaking at his sides. No.

“I died first.” Gideon said, stepping forward and putting a hand on his nephew’s shoulder who immediately shrugged it off. “Killed me a second time to see my brother die a minute later.”

“There’s no ending war without sacrifice. But it took five Death Eaters to take us down, and there’s no shame in that.”

Fred’s lip twitched involuntarily and his mouth curled up pathetically for a second. He didn’t turn around, but lifted his eyes from the grass to look across the field, and at the little broom cupboard in front of him.

“Why am I here?” He asked quietly, reaching up and wiping his eyes on his sleeve. “What is all this?”

And then suddenly, his uncles were on either side of him and he subconsciously realised he was several inches taller than them.  
“I think it’s your choice, Fred.” Said Fabian from his left, his hands tucked in his pockets as he followed Fred’s gaze.

“I wish we’d been around to see you boys grow up. To actually know our namesakes.” Gideon joined in and took a few steps forward before turning sideways to look at Fred and Fabian.

“Gid, do you remember when you told Molly that if she had twins she had to name them after us?-”

“-And then they were born, and she actually did it.” Gideon grinned and Fred noted vaguely just how much Charlie resembled them.

“Fred Gideon and George Fabian Weasley.” Fabian smirked, and looked at the young man beside him out of the corner of his eye.

“Thanks, but I already know my name.” Fred said dryly and started to walk slowly to the broom cupboard.

As he touched the door and felt the wood under his fingers, a surge of nostalgia washed over him. All those years the Weasley children would go out and play Quidditch and the many, many times they spent trying to show Ron the best way to throw a Quaffle or how Ginny would stomp her foot and plead with their parents to let her fly with the boys. It all rushed by in his mind.

He remembered the time he and George ganged up on Charlie and held him still on his broom so Bill could get a goal past him, and how Bill had been a terrible Keeper whenever he tried. Fred could remember trying out for the team in their second year, and how Charlie, who was Captain at the time, had been extremely impressed with the twins’ “natural talent for beating” and put them on the team right away after tryouts.

He remembered being angrier with Malfoy in their unfinished seventh year than he had ever been and how George and Harry had beaten the little git to a pulp while it took the efforts of all three Chasers to restrain Fred.

He loved Quidditch, and now he would never play again.

He broke from the daze with a jerk and moved his hand back like it had been burned as a final, more painful memory flashed through his mind. It was the flight from Privet Drive which had resulted in Mad-Eye’s death and the loss of his twin’s ear. He remembered the dizziness that had washed over him when George screamed in the distance and the nausea that rose in his throat as he knew immediately something had gone terribly wrong.

Had George felt the same thing when he was killed? Had he known somewhere inside him that something was wrong. Was that really a thing? Or had it only been coincidence that night last July?

“I could tell, even if I hadn’t seen it, when Gideon died.” Fabian suddenly said, as though he could read Fred’s thoughts, from where he stood beside his brother watching Fred. “I don’t know about muggles, but with us, twins are joined just as much by magic as by blood and that is a powerful thing indeed.”

Fred swallowed a lump and looked back around at them. It wasn’t just because he was dead that he felt incomplete, George had to feel much the same and probably worse.

“I can’t put him through this…” He whispered, the image of his family crying over him, and George’s screams plaguing his mind. “I know it’ll kill him, ‘cause it would kill me.” Determination flashed in his eyes and he hurriedly walked back over to the Prewetts. “What happens if I go down there? If I go back?” He asked, pointing to the Burrow down the hill.

The twins in front of him suddenly looked just as pained as Fred felt, no doubt remembering exactly what it was like to watch each other die. Fred didn’t know which of them had found it harder, all he knew was how much it would hurt to bid everyone a real farewell.

“You’ll only be a ghost.” Gideon answered softly. “Not even a shell of yourself, more of a…a-”

“-An imprint.” Fabian finished for his brother. “You know the same ghosts I know, Nick, the Fat Friar, Bloody Baron, all of them-”

“They seem to have a pretty good deal now.” Fred interrupted.

“You might think that, but I’ll bet you anything than some of them regret making that choice.” His uncle continued, crossing his arms loosely over his chest. “It can’t be undone. You’re trapped back in that world forever, not alive but not completely dead and gone.”

“Are you supposed to actually influence me to choose?” Fred asked, a little suspiciously. “‘Cause I’d be permanently gone here too.”

“And yet…” Fabian shrugged and gestured to himself and Gideon. “We’ve been dead for seventeen years and here we are.”

“Fred.” Gideon said firmly and set his hand on the younger, albeit taller, wizard’s shoulder. “You’ll have to watch everyone you love die in time if you go back as a ghost knowing that you’ll never, ever speak to them again unless they choose the same path you did.”

They were right, and Fred knew it. After all, the ghosts at Hogwarts were centuries old, how many people must they have lost never to even have the chance of seeing again.

“I don’t know how to be alone…”He murmured and ran his hand through his fiery hair.

“But you’re not. And neither is George unless he chooses to be.” The brothers exchanged a look “We know it’s hard, but you were right. We did go down side by side, and we went the right way fighting for the right thing.” A fire flashed in Gideon’s brown eyes that looked extraordinarily like the way Molly’s eyes flashed when she knew she was right. “And by the way, so did you and everyone else who died for the war, the first one, and this one.”

“Seeing him dead, before I went too was…” Fabian looked away for a second, reliving some distant memory and then looked Fred in the eyes steadily. “The hardest thing I ever went through and I know how your twin must feel, I know the kind of pain he’s gonna deal with every day and I only went through it for less than a minute. But you’re twins…and certainly not muggles, do you think dying can really stop that?”

“That’s the thing about magical blood…” Gideon continued and both twins smiled identically. “The blood might stop flowing and go cold…but the magic doesn’t go away that easy.”

George would choose to be alone and Fred knew it. George probably wouldn’t let anybody in for a long time, and to say he was worried and scared for his brother would be an understatement. He knew how he would react himself, and could only pray that George would be different.

Fred nodded slowly and looked longingly at the Burrow. He couldn’t go back. They were both right, he couldn’t do it. An eternal un-life of being ‘there but not really’ was not what Fred would ever want, he would be miserable, and it would take his family a lot longer to move on if he lingered there as a spirit of himself.

“I suppose it…was a good life.” He said slowly and turned on the spot, “Can I see them when I want to?”

“Don’t know.” Both the Prewetts answered in unison and exchanged a glance.

“Perhaps as long as they need you, it isn’t really goodbye after all. Time isn’t the same here.” Fabian finished.

“You have to decide, Fred. You can’t stay in limbo forever.” Gideon stepped forward and held out his hand to rub his nephew’s shoulder. “There’s not much more we can say for you but the pain _will_ heal.”

“He’s right. It’s up to you, not us.” Fabian smiled, and nodded a few times. “You’re a good man, you’ll know what you need to do.”

Fred returned the smile as best he could, and it made it halfway to his eyes before he looked over his shoulder at the lone broom cupboard. He knew what was in there, and he knew what he needed to choose.

“I’m sc-Uncle Gideon?” As he turned back, Fred’s heart dropped. They were gone.

The twin sighed and rubbed his face as he looked over the place. It felt so real, and so like home that he couldn’t help it, he sat down, and lay back in the grass. Closing his eyes he was flooded with memories again.

Every time his mother had shouted at him, every time she made he and George empty their pockets and left them fuming at her. Stealing their father’s car with Ron to rescue Harry. Ginny’s birthday, when they knew they had a little sister to be protective of. Conjuring a Patronus for the first time. Percy packing his bags and disowning them all years ago…and then returning to plead for forgiveness earlier that very night. Bill and Fleur’s wedding. Charlie’s dragons. He and George opening their shop for the very first time….and when the Death Eaters tore it to pieces coming after them. George lying pale and bloody on the couch with only one ear. Being sorted into Gryffindor on their very first day at Hogwarts.

Fred opened his eyes and a tear slid silently down the side of his face. Experimentally he reached up a trembling and pale hand and drew a circle in the air like Fabian had done. Nothing happened.

His heart didn’t beat anymore but it was breaking as he slowly got to his feet and walked toward the broom cupboard.

He opened the door and sure enough there, leaning against the wall, was his old broom. With slightly trembling hands, Fred took it and lifted it out of the little, wardrobe sized room.

His uncles had been right. He couldn’t stay here and he couldn’t be a ghost. He just had to hope this really wasn’t goodbye. He was dead, he was gone from the living world, but there was still pain. Strangely, he found he was almost glad for it. It meant there was still a tie there, that he wouldn’t be forgotten, that he knew his twin was still alive. Maybe it meant he could still see them sometimes. They had said that as long as he was needed…and George would always need him.  
How Fred hoped what they said was true.

“I have to go.” He said aloud to nobody and mounted his broom. Slowly, his feet left the ground and he hovered a few feet in the air.

Then something moved him to try again what he had tried lying on the ground. He closed his eyes, concentrated with everything he had left, raised his right hand and moved it in a slow circle. He heard nothing and opened his eyes slowly. Had he had any breath, it would have caught in his throat. It worked.

How long had passed? He couldn’t tell, time was certainly different in…wherever he was, limbo. But it couldn’t have been long, they were still in the remnants of the castle, although it looked far lighter.

George’s wand was hanging from his fingers which swung limply at his side. It was over. They must have won. His twin was walking, stepping over rubble and, to Fred’s great dismay, many bodies. How many had lost their lives? How many were in their own limbo like he was?

Behind George Fred could see Oliver Wood and Alicia Spinnet who were staring at his brother sadly as he sat down and buried his head in his hands. His fingers gripped at his red hair and his shoulders were shaking badly with the sobs that Fred knew he was trying to hold back. And then Percy was there, wrapping his arm around George’s shoulders and Fred had never been more grateful to his older brother…until George pulled away from him. It was already happening as Fred knew it would, George was doing exactly what Fred imagined he would do. He was already isolating himself when they should have been most united.

“I’m so sorry, Georgie.” He whispered and rubbed his chest where his heart felt so heavy that it might drop right out.  
His twin’s hands seemed to tighten in his hair and Fred wondered for one very hopeful second if he had heard him. But that wasn’t possible.

“This isn’t goodbye.”

xxxXxxx

For a second or two in the mirror, or a whispered “here” that broke through the white noise in his brother’s head, Fred was always there. He knew when George hurt the most, he knew when he was needed, and he did it. He could feel when George just wanted to roll over and give up and he did his best to stop it by trying to make his twin see that he wasn’t really gone completely. That he was always with him.

Fred and George Weasley had always been just that, Fred _and_ George Weasley. Twins, partners in crime, as close and inseparable as two brothers could be. They were supposed to be there for the other, and now that it was only George…well…death couldn’t really stop that so easily.


End file.
